A Fundamental First Step
Over more than 40 years of experience working with families has taught us that for all parents, a basic but comprehensive understanding of child development, neuroplasticity, and nutrition is foundational to a child’s future success. That is why we created An Introduction to Child Brain Development and Neurological Organization as a fundamental first step towards understanding and guiding children.
What you will learn
University-Backed Evidence of Child Brain Development Growth
A university-led study funded by Comfama evaluated the impact of the Neuro Playground program across multiple preschools and grades. The results showed consistent, statistically significant improvements in children’s motor skills, socio-emotional development, learning readiness, and overall neurodevelopment. In several centers—particularly Rionegro—more than 50% of children advanced to the “achieved” level in key socio-emotional indicators, with experimental groups showing stronger performance and less variability than control groups.
The research also found meaningful progress among children with disabilities and in First Grade groups assessed over multiple intervals. Large effect sizes in motor, socio-emotional, and learning readiness dimensions indicate that Neuro Playground effectively supports diverse learners while helping close developmental gaps. Overall, the study concludes that the program provides systematic, intentional, and impactful stimulation that elevates child development across a wide range of ages and abilities.
PRINCIPAL RESEARCHERS
- Paola Andrea Mesa Villa – Psychologist and Master’s degree in Childhood Studies
- Viviana Gomez Porras – Bachelor in Special Education and Master’s degree in Education
Measuring Results
The effectiveness of any therapeutic approach must be periodically assessed using standardized and validated measures. The Family Hope Center assesses the effectiveness of its approach using the WeeFIM®, the pediatric version of the Functional Independence MeasureTM (FIM®).
Both the FIM® and WeeFIM® were developed by Uniform Data System for Medical Rehabilitation (UDSMR) from the World Health Organization’s bio-psycho-social model of disability. They are functional assessment tools for evaluating essential abilities in individuals with neurodevelopmental disabilities along three dimensions: self-care, motor function, and cognition.
UDSMR notes: “Since its inception in 1987, the FIM® instrument has been widely regarded and adopted by clinicians and researchers around the world for its brevity and reliability. A sizeable library of supporting research and study sustains the FIM® instrument’s reliability and validity. To date, more than 1,300 published articles support the FIM® instrument, and ongoing research and study continues.”1 (Read more clinical research about the WeeFIM® here).
Our WeeFIM® results show that children’s neurological and functional capabilities significantly improve through the Family Hope Center’s parent-implemented home-based therapy.
What Parents Who Are Physicians Say About the FHC Approach
Liz Strawbridge, MD
Main Integrative Healing
After suffering a stroke and severe meningitis, my 4-year-old son was left with right sided motor impairment, difficulty with short and long-term memory, spatial disorientation and sensory processing issues. As many parents who suffer the trauma of having a brain-injured child, we could see his heart and soul were still bursting with abundant life and beauty.
As a physician, I was very familiar with the conventional treatment plan of PT and OT laid forth by his brilliant team of doctors at Boston Children’s Hospital. I was struck by how these therapies addressed the symptoms (muscle weakness) rather than the root of the problem (a hurt brain). It made much more sense to me that we should be working on creating new neurological pathways rather than trying to fix the manifestation of the broken ones to work.
The 3-day seminar led by the Newells and their team was a crash course in neurodevelopment which dovetailed beautifully with recent data around the science of neuroplasticity. They use detailed anatomical and developmental neural network maps in the brain to evaluate where along the timeline of brain development your child suffered injury, causing a dysfunctional pathway for that particular network resulting in downstream consequences. They design a personalized plan for each child based on the particular sequence of neural dysfunctions and help strengthen the network from the origin of the dysfunction rather than fixing the symptom that is revealing itself.
It is a complete multi-modal brain health approach: optimizing nutrition and fuel for neuro-regeneration, using physiology of breathwork to enhance oxygenation of brain tissue, incorporating body and energy work to repattern pathways, creating a unique sensory stimulation program, and returning to basic motor and reflex pathways such as crawling to develop a strong foundation for the most effective brain development. As parents, we are not just shown an action plan which is extremely empowering, but we are given hope, support, and community.
We saw significant gains after working on the program with our son for 6 months. Both his neurologist and neurosurgeon have been blown away by his progress. The program helps your child adapt and become more resilient, not just get “band aid solutions” that don’t promote his or her potentiality and evolution. Now I have applied aspects that I’ve learned from the program with my other children, myself, and even my patients. I am excited to use this book as a resource in my office and share it with my community.
Madhavi Gupta Dyen, MD
Board Certified Neurologist
When I had my son, I felt many of the things that parents who learn that their child has neuro-development issues do: fear, a sense of loss, and more fear. If I knew what I know now, fear wouldn’t even be in my vocabulary. We had been lucky enough to be directed to the Family Hope Center when my son was an infant.
With a diagnosis of Down syndrome and a very nasty bout of a rare seizure type, my son has gone beyond ‘thriving.’ He is remarkable. He talks, walks, jokes, loves, reads, and laughs like the master of his world that he is.
We continue to expand his brain by use and the principles of the neuro-development program taught to us by the Newells and the specialists at the Family Hope Center. There are no limits to what my son can achieve. I credit the sound principles, based in science and core neurology, and his team for helping him get there.
Dr. Shirley-Anne Jourdan, MD, GP
South Africa
I came to the Family Hope Center course as an exhausted parent, a frustrated wife, a disillusioned academic, and a resistant medical not-so-professional. I did not believe that 3 days of talking about what I presumed to be neuro-pseudo-science would change my outlook forever. I came heavily armed and guarded with a career of preconceived ideas, arguments, opinions, and training about neuro-development. And I was gently persuaded to pack my weapons away without giving up the science.
The Family Hope Center has the heart of the Healer that I have always longed to cultivate more fully – one who promotes ability and does not stop at disability. The Center focuses on ease, not disease; on full function, not dysfunction, on treats and not just treatment, on joy and not on sadness.
I left the conference feeling contagiously overjoyed at how attainable and do-able the steps to healing can be. Complexity was exchanged for plain and simple truths, demonstrations, testimonies, and results. Yet a sense of awe was maintained at how intricately the brain was designed. Simple ways to experience the magnificent. It was like being given a road map with milestones and beacons to follow through steep mountain paths.
The Family Hope Center team has trodden and carved out these paths over years of research, experience, and training. Their pioneering walk has made the path now possible for everyday parents to walk – every day in their own shoes, in their own homes. And the paths bring thousands to new places and heights and viewpoints.
As I sat in the conference, like being on a mountain top – my eyes were gently opened to realize how God has given us all we need for healing – the air we breathe, the water, the food, the ground under our feet, and the love for our children, and it took my breath away. I will never be the same. And I am ever grateful that the Family Hope Center took me to the precipice; where I did not want to be challenged and with a safe guardrail of evidence and science opened my eyes to look over the edge at new frontiers of hope.
Dr. George Goodwin, MD
Internal medicine physician at Fort Belvoir Community Hospital,
US Army colonel, and
former Director of Disability Evaluations at the Office of the Surgeon General
“Foreword to Healing Your Child’s Brain”
As an internal medicine physician with more than twenty years of experience, I carried a high degree of skepticism toward alternative treatment systems that had not already been clinically proven. I received my doctor of medicine from the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland. I am board certified in internal medicine. I had the privilege to serve for over twenty-five years in the army. During my career, I was deployed twice, serving our soldiers in both Iraq and Afghanistan. I also was the chief medical officer for a military medical facility at Fort Eustis, Virginia. I culminated my career as a colonel in the Pentagon overseeing the disability program for our wounded warriors and directing all the medical standards for readiness in the army. All this experience was within what would be considered traditional medicine.
For my wife, Renee, and I, our journey began with a son who had developmental delays and social challenges in a spectrum disorder. We noted within the first couple of years that although our son was developing physically, he had severe difficulty interacting with others in normal social environments (preschool, church, and other social gatherings). We had our son evaluated several times. We were encouraged by both his teachers and conventional medical providers to put him on medication for ADHD, but never elected to do so. Instead, we were looking for alternatives to help him succeed. Therefore, when one of my colleagues at the Pentagon informed me of the work that Matthew and Carol were doing with their three children, I was cautiously intrigued. He shared the impacts that they were seeing in their children’s progress, which was a personal perspective that I could see firsthand.
Renee and I chose to go to a three-day parent training conference to research the actual methodology being implemented at the Family Hope Center. Employing a very holistic approach, Matthew and Carol demonstrated the observable impacts they have seen over nearly forty years of clinical experience. During our time there, I studied all the material that was provided and researched as much medical literature as I could obtain on neuroplasticity and brain healing. Although I still did not fully understand all the underlying physiology of the healing that they were observing, Renee and I decided to partner with Matthew and Carol and the team at the Family Hope Center to see what impact it would have with our son and family because I was convinced that sufficient evidence existed in literature and in the early research Matthew and Carol were completing.
We did have to make some changes in our life to integrate the holistic approach to obtain improvement for our son. The biggest changes were in our schedule (time management and calendar planning) and our diet. The whole family made some adjustments. However, the results were unquestionable. Our son’s improvements in his physical abilities, social interactions, and application of cognitive learning were immense. I was unsure how my son would be able to survive in the world with the deficits we were seeing, but now we are confident that he will be able not only to survive but to thrive in the world around him.
As the fields of neurocognitive research, neural development, and brain healing continue to develop, it is exciting to see pioneers that continue to partner with families and to see clinical impacts in the lives of young men and women. Both as a physician and a father, I am thrilled to witness this work being published. It is imperative these perspectives on healing be shared.
This book will begin to provide insights into the application of the principles that Renee and I have used to see the improvements in our home. These clinically proven results based on this fresh approach will positively impact more families, providing hope!
Welcome to the Family Hope Center
For more than 40 years, we’ve studied the neurological origins of disabilities in children and incorporated knowledge from global experts in complementary disciplines.
As our understanding deepened, we developed practical, effective ways of promoting and measuring neurological healing and growth in children.
We had to apply everything we learned to two of our own children with disabilities to help them overcome their limitations and become the independent, well-adjusted, productive, responsible adults they are today.
This transformative experience drove us to dedicate our lives to making this knowledge accessible to parents all over the world so that they, too, can help their children heal and grow.
This course is a fundamental first step towards understanding and guiding children.
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